What causes this?

[BrewMeister]

Hello all,

This is no doubt a newbie question, but I've never been able to receive a clear cut answer as to what causes this:

It happened to this stick today, and I've had it happen to perhaps 15-20% of whatever I smoke. I keep all my sticks in a humidor, this one has been in there at least a month, with 65%RH beads.

Any ideas?

TIA

 

[Jeffro600]

Usually its too much humidity...they have so much moisture in them that when you fire them up, it causes the trapped moisture to expand which in turn splits your wrappers. At least, thats how its been explained to me.

And judging by the shape of the ash, id say this is a fairly correct guess...as your outside is burning faster than the inside...i.e...youve got more humidity trapped in the center of the cigar. Let those smokes rest a bit more before you light anymore up.

 

[ree ree robusto]

I think it too dry on the outside and more moisture in the inside that causes that to burn like a cone.

 

[Shiba]

I had this happen to some very dry cigars that were suddenly placed in my humidor. I think that they were so dry, they all the sudden started to absorb the humidity and swelled up. This swelling caused the wrapper to split. This was the case with me anyway.

 

[indyrob]

Too much humidity for sure...it's like having the excess moisture turn to "steam" and expanding forcing the wrapper to split. I would calibrate your hygrometer if you hadn't done that already.

There are some dry/damp meters for sale if you really want to get to the bottom of it. Stick it in the foot and it'll tell you if it's dry, perfect, or too damp to smoke.

 

[theorangeman]

Hey Brewmeister, for cigars in which this occurs, how long have they rested in your humi from the time that you bought them? Reason I ask is that it sounds like your humi is being controlled well (65%), however, it may be that cigars that you are getting are at a much higher humidity level and they haven't had a chance to adjust adequately in your humi. What may happen is that the outside of some of your cigars are adjusting, but if you're not letting them sit for a while (at least a couple of weeks) the tobacco inside the sticks haven't had ample time to adjust to the same level of humidity as the wrapper. Therefore, as Jeffro described above, the wrapper burns faster than the inside (and the tobacco expands causing the cigar to split).

Just a hypothesis...

 

[Ginseng]

That's some baaaaad coning. Points to one major culprit and that is imbalance of humidity (or more accurately, moisture level) between the tobacco at the center of the filler and the wrapper/binder. In this case, it's more moist at the center of the stick.

So, either the stick came from a significantly moister environment and started to dry out in your humi or, it was properly humidified but you started to smoke it in a dry environment and the wrapper dried out rapidly and split. This latter scenario has happened to me with some regularity when smoking in my garage in the winter.

It might be worth doing a calibration of your beads/hygrometer.

Wilkey

 

[BrewMeister]

Thanks all for the responses...

I have calibrated the hydrometers and the 65% beads seem to be fool-proof all three hydrometers are rock-solid at 62-66%.

As I said this stick was in the humidor for a month at least. I have three humidor and one coolidors. It has happen to sticks from at least two of them.

I bought five, yes five, (don't ask why) of these stupid meters:

Best I can determine, in order for the meter to register in the green (good to smoke) area, you'd have to spray them with H2O... either that or all of my sticks are very very very dry.

Now some of the my smokes, for example my Ashton VSG's they never do this, and for the most part I see it more in the Natural wrappers.

The coning of the ash may be in part, because I rolled the stick pretty good in the ashtray to clean the ashes off before I started handling my camera, I don't think the normal burn was that much of a cone, but I'll have to pay more attention to that in the future.

 

[inflatus]

I get these when my brother gives me a smoke. Too much humidity is correct. Check out that humidor brother.

 

[indyrob]

Thanks all for the responses...


Best I can determine, in order for the meter to register in the green (good to smoke) area, you'd have to spray them with H2O... either that or all of my sticks are very very very dry.

Now some of the my smokes, for example my Ashton VSG's they never do this, and for the most part I see it more in the Natural wrappers.

[snapback]249039[/snapback]​

I'm sure that this isn't that big of a deal to most of the brothers here, but it is a bit of a bugger ain't it?

I have only had one bad experience with splitting and that was with a Punch VRII about 2 years ago.

Are the bad sticks all coming from the same vendor? Maybe that's your problem. I'm not saying your getting bad sticks from them, but your setup is probably alot different from thiers. If the sticks in question are sitting for a lenghty time in an eviorment that's more moist than yours, then of course you need to let yours sit longer than usuall.

But then again...what do I know?

 

[BrewMeister]

I'm sure that this isn't that big of a deal to most of the brothers here, but it is a bit of a bugger ain't it?

I have only had one bad experience with splitting and that was with a Punch VRII about 2 years ago.

Are the bad sticks all coming from the same vendor? Maybe that's your problem. I'm not saying your getting bad sticks from them, but your setup is probably alot different from thiers. If the sticks in question are sitting for a lenghty time in an eviorment that's more moist than yours, then of course you need to let yours sit longer than usuall.

But then again...what do I know?

[snapback]249159[/snapback]​

You got that right IndyRob! "A BIT OF A BUGGER".
I have seen it also, with some Gurkha Sticks that I smoked at my Brother-in-laws house. As far as any commonality, as to the origin of the sticks, danged if I know? I've not kept close enough track of that, up till now. My guess is that they have come from varying sources. But I'll need to keep better records.

Thanks again to all for the suggestions and hypotheses...

 

[jabba]

I had this happen to some very dry cigars that were suddenly placed in my humidor. I think that they were so dry, they all the sudden started to absorb the humidity and swelled up. This swelling caused the wrapper to split. This was the case with me anyway.

[snapback]249029[/snapback]​

I agree, seems that it happened to me when there was a sudden humidity shock. ie. letting your RH fall down to say 60% then rapidly humidifying back up to 70. I find leaving the cello on helps to stablize this a little bit.

 

[tangomar]

I get the problem when I move sticks to the travel humi then back into the big one.

 

[BrewMeister]

I get the problem when I move sticks to the travel humi then back into the big one.

[snapback]254914[/snapback]​

Interesting tangomar??
How long do you leave them in the travel humidor? And then how long in the regular humidor before you light them up?

 

[tangomar]

Like a weekend in the travel then usally let them sit in the big humi a good week to relax, Doesnt happen all the time but its always the sticks that travel.

 

[Wurm]

I get the problem when I move sticks to the travel humi then back into the big one.

[snapback]254914[/snapback]​

I plan on putting some beads in my travel-dor... that should do the trick

 

[tangomar]

I agree, I plan on buying a tube from Viper.

 

[Big100HD]

So, either the stick came from a significantly moister environment and started to dry out in your humi or, it was properly humidified but you started to smoke it in a dry environment and the wrapper dried out rapidly and split. This latter scenario has happened to me with some regularity when smoking in my garage in the winter.

I find this true, smoking outside or in a colder environment causes some of my cigars to split on occasion. The colder air will dry out the wrapper almost immediately. Especially on natural wrappers.

This is what you need on your patio for winter smoking.

Keeps you nice and toasty.

 

[The Master]

Forget about what these gauges say, smoking quality is how you judge if your cigars are at the proper humidity level. Drop your humidity to 60 percent. The cigars will still be supple but when you cut the cigar it should crackle just a bit.

Also the temperature is a big consideration. I keep all mine at 65-67 degrees. If yours are 70 degrees and higher,and if you go outside where it is very cold, your cigars will crack in those conditions.